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Friday, October 16, 2009

Twelve endangered puaiohi, or small Kauai thrush, were released on Kauai in Hawaii after being raised in captivity at the San Diego Zoo. The release is part of an effort to boost the species's population.

Contractors at the closed Hanford nuclear weapons plant in Washington state must track down radioactive rabbit droppings to complete a thorough environmental cleanup. Rabbits had burrowed in contaminated parts of the site and then left their droppings in other areas.

After two attempts, Australia has still not managed to fix a leak in an oil drilling rig in the Timor Sea. Hundreds of barrels of oil per day have been spilling from the leak for two months.

Five large nonnative snake species pose a major threat to invade U.S. ecosystems: Burmese pythons, northern and southern African pythons, boa constrictors and yellow anacondas. Four other species pose lesser but still serious risks of invasion.